


Fear of the Unknown

by Warp5Complex_Archivist



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-13
Updated: 2010-09-13
Packaged: 2018-08-15 21:46:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8073895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Warp5Complex_Archivist/pseuds/Warp5Complex_Archivist
Summary: Tucker and Reed have been kidnapped.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).

This is the first fan fiction I have ever written, so... be gentle?

The mistakes - of which I'm sure there are a few - are mine, all mine. 

Oh, and the Enterprise boys? I don't own them, I'm only borrowing them. I promise I will put them back where I found them! The rest of the characters that appear sprang from my own mind, like Athena from Zeus' forehead. Or something like that.

* * *

The first thing Malcolm noticed when he opened his eyes, was the fact that he might as well not have opened them at all, for all the good it was doing him. He didnâ€™t know where he was, or how he had gotten here, but it certainly wasnâ€™t a place that he cared to stay. Occasionally, through the impenetrable darkness that surrounded him, he heard signs of life; a cough, a whimper, a whispered string of words in a language he didnâ€™t understandâ€¦ Most significantly, there was the sound of heavy breathing somewhere to his left. It sounded like the labored breath of someone with a cold. He stared in the direction the sound was coming from. It had to be close for him to hear it so clearly, but the darkness might as well have been a wall. He could see nothing, and he was hesitant to move closer. Instead, he sat very still, with his knees drawn up to his chin. His heart thumped violently in his chest, pumping adrenaline through his system. He could actually feel his blood coursing through him, too hotly, turning him into a tightly wound spring, destined to burst at any moment. There was so much energy, so much will to do _something_ , anything to improve his situation, but there was nothing to channel it into, just this vast darkness. 

He didnâ€™t know how long he sat like that, hugging his legs and rocking back and forth at a steady pace. It could have been minutes, and it could have been hours. The breathing next to him had slowed, and become easier, until at one point, he flinched, his mind questioning wildly where it had gone. He held his own breath, and listened. It was still there. He almost let out a sigh of relief, when suddenly, the breathing was disguised by movement. It was a shift in position, at most, but it still made him freeze. There was another sound of movement, and another. He waited. The silence was unbearable, though it wasnâ€™t truly silent at all; there were still those other noises all around him, but between him and the other creature, there was silence. An expectant silence, during which Malcolm knew that he was being sized up. Could it see him any better than he could see it? Was it as frightened as he was? Did it have anything to do with why he was here, and how he had gotten here? Try as he might, he could not remember walking willingly into this place, which begged the question of _whether_ he had walked in willingly. Experience would indicate otherwise, but he couldnâ€™t remember a struggle, or anything strange that would account for his whereabouts. All he could remember was waking up, and seeing nothing but darkness. 

He strained his mind, willing it to pick out the details from the deep recesses of his memory, but there was nothing. What was the last thing he could remember before it went black? An away mission, he decided, though the scene played in his head as if through a thin veil. He had been sent to provide security while Dr. Phlox and Crewman Cutler studied the plant life on the uninhabited planet they had found. At least, they had thought it was uninhabited when they had stepped out of the shuttle pod. Who else had been there with him? Commander Tucker had cheerfully joked about the novelty of fresh air after months in space, while gulping down a generous lungful. Archer had been there too, and Tâ€™Pol and Sato. Had they left, to go back to Enterprise before night fell? He vaguely remembered Archer telling the away team to behave themselves, before helping Sato into the shuttle pod, and then closing the door behind him. Malcolm closed his eyes, willing the picture of their camp to become clearer, to see the faces that had told him goodnight before ducking into their tents. Ensigns Porter, Robertson, and Beckett. They had been in the tent nearest to the stream. Ensigns Graham, Gray and Gordon had been in the one next to his and Tripâ€™s tent. Phlox, crewmen Cutler and Perry had set up their tent a little further away, in the shade of a giant tree of some sort, with the sorrowfully sloping branches of a weeping willow, only the bark and the leaves were pitch black. Who else? Was there anyone else?

The scratching squeal of a heavy door opening - the loudest noise he had heard so far in this place - brought him harshly back. He quickly tried to find the sound of breathing again, but it was useless, because after the squeal of rusty hinges followed footsteps. A faint bar of light appeared on the floor across the room from him. Whereas the rest of the room was bathed in black, where this beam fell, he could make out shadowy forms. He could make out human shapes, though the legs were a little too short, and the shoulders a little too broad, like a caricature of a muscle man. 

There was a click. And then there was light. Far too much of it, in fact. Whereas before, the darkness had prevented him from making out anything, the extreme light was now taking over this task. He screwed his eyes shut against it, already seeing the purple afterimages of the too-bright lamps that the newcomers had turned on. He tried opening his eyes slowly, bit by bit, until they had become habituated to the light. Quickly, he glanced over at the breathing creature to his left, more than eager to finally see the entity that had kept him company, and in utter agony since he had woken up.


	2. Chapter 2

The boys still don't belong to me, sadly. I'm only playing with them, and I'll put them back when I'm done. The mistakes, however, are still all mine.

* * *

To his surprise, a familiar face looked back at him. A pair of blue eyes under a messy mop of blond hair. Relief flooded through him. â€œMalcolm!â€ Trip exclaimed, his voice low, though there was a high note of anxiety laced through the statement. Malcolm could only stare back at the other man, his mouth hanging open. The commander had a cut above his right eye. It was deep, but it had been tended to. Dr. Phlox would probably not have approved of the primitive stitches connecting the edges, or the rand of dirt that surrounded the wound, but Malcolm doubted there was a complaint department around here. 

â€œWhere are we?â€ he whispered, noticing the same note of desperation in his own voice as in Tripâ€™s, despite the attempt to keep the volume down. 

â€œI rememberâ€¦â€ Trip started, his eyes narrowing and drawing his eyebrows into a slack v-shape. â€œIt was a noise. It woke me up. Someone was standing over you, and I thought theyâ€™d killed you.â€ He met Malcolmâ€™s eyes. 

â€œHow did you get the cut?â€ Malcolm asked, pointing towards the gash on Tripâ€™s forehead. Tripâ€™s hand rose quickly, his fingers connecting with the wound. He winced at the touch. 

â€œI donâ€™t think they meant to wake me,â€ he said. â€œThey were probably going to knock me out like they did you. But then I did wake up, and there was a struggle.â€ He paused, eyes downcast. â€œNot much of one, Iâ€™m afraid. I didnâ€˜t see it coming.â€

â€œNeither did I,â€ Malcolm responded. His voice was a mix of anger and sadness. He was about to say something more, but Trip shushed him with a tiny jerk of his head. His attention now appropriately directed, Malcolm was quick to notice the approaching footsteps. He glanced in the direction they were coming from. The creatures that came walking towards them still reminded him of caricatures, even now, when he could see them clearly instead of obscured by shadows. Their legs were short, and clad in tight fitting trousers stuffed into knee high boots with soft soles. On their powerful upper bodies, they wore shirts open halfway down their chests, one dark purple, the other maroon. Around their necks, they had thin golden chains, with medallions attached.

He was almost afraid of looking at their faces, but when he finally did, there was nothing appalling about them. Their eyes were a startling color, unnatural to his Earthly perspective. Underneath, there were black swirls, but he couldnâ€™t tell if they were some sort of tattoos or the natural markings of the race they belonged to. 

One of them noticed him staring at them, and he quickly looked down. He heard a chuckle coming from the man, followed by a garble of words, and then a louder laugh. He swallowed, glancing over at Trip, who raised his eyebrows at him. â€œAre those theâ€¦â€ Malcolm whispered. The response was a curt nod. 

â€œWell, not the exact ones,â€ Trip said. â€œAt least I donâ€™t think so.â€ He looked over at the two men, assessing them. â€œWhat are they doing?â€ Malcolm shrugged. One of the men, the one with the dark purple shirt, was carrying a sack slung carelessly over his shoulder. A few of the people he passed - a beautiful woman with a torn and dirty dress, and a young boy with a severely bruised face, in particular - looked hopefully at him, but in return, they received nothing but indifference. Malcolm surveyed the room, and noticed that the woman and the boy werenâ€™t the only people paying special attention to the pair, although most were being more subtle about it, casting occasional glances rather than openly staring. He decided that the former approach would be the best one, and started studying a tear in his uniform, near his knee. He didnâ€™t know how it had happened. He poked his finger through the hole. There was a tear in his skin too, but it was little more than a scratch. Nothing at all compared to the gash above Tripâ€™s eye. 

They were coming closer and closer, though it was a slow process. Every now and then, and according to no pattern that Malcolm could discern, they stopped next to a person, or a group of people. They were handing out food, he realized, and as if on cue, his stomach grumbled loudly. How long had it been since he had eaten? It irritated him that he couldnâ€™t even remember that. 

â€œHow long have we been here?â€ he asked Trip, but the other man merely gave him a blank stare in response. 

â€œYour guess is as good as mine,â€ Trip said. â€œBut if your belly is anything to go by, it must have been a while.â€ He tried to smile, but it turned out to be more of a grimace. Malcolm replied with a grimace of his own, then sighed heavily. â€œDo you think theyâ€™ll feed us?â€ Trip asked, with an expression reminiscent of the one Malcolm had seen on the young boy merely minutes ago. Apparently, he too had noticed that only a select group of people were chosen to receive their share of the food. 

â€œI hope so,â€ Malcolm said, but the frown that went with the statement indicated anything but hopefulness. He wore a grim expression as he watched the woman with the dirty dress who had already been passed by. She was sitting cross legged on the floor now, either not noticing or not caring that the position gave everyone in the room a wonderful view of her legs. Or perhaps it simply wasnâ€™t part of her culture to see legs as sexual cues. Although he couldnâ€™t pinpoint her home planet, she certainly wasnâ€™t human. Even from this distance, Malcolm could see that her ears were pointed, like a Vulcanâ€™s, but much longer, poking out through her auburn hair. 

The time it took for the two men to reach the spot where Malcolm and Trip were sitting, felt like an eternity that simply wouldnâ€™t end, and yet, Malcolm was watching them draw nearer with something akin to trepidation building inside him. They were the last stop on their route, sitting in the far corner of the room. He tried to appear disinterested in the pair as they approached, but he couldnâ€™t help but steal glances in their direction. Trip, too, he noticed, couldnâ€™t seem to keep his eyes off them for long. Finally, they halted, only a few steps away from the commander. Malcolm swallowed, and looked up. Their strange colored eyes seemed even more unnatural up close, piercing like no other race he had ever encountered. Maybe he was just imagining it, his fantasies fueled by the fear that was still pumping through him. 

â€œMishara elmarie gig rah?â€ said the one in the maroon shirt. Bewildered, Trip and Malcolm could do nothing but stare at him, uncomprehending. â€œMiyaline gerli ersone marieth gain.â€ This was directed at his companion, who gave a snort of laughter. It was a harsh sound, full of cruel mirth. A reply was issued, in the same strange language. It had a rather musical quality to it, and it seemed odd, coming from these two, because of their hulking frames. It would have been beautiful, even, if it werenâ€™t for the fact that they both knew this would forever be the language of their oppressors. 

The encounter was over quickly, after a few more statements that they could not understand. Then, the sack was opened and the man dug out a loaf of bread, which he tossed onto the floor in front of Trip, followed by a bottle filled with liquid that was faintly green. The two men hesitated a moment, but when neither Trip, nor Malcolm made any move towards their gifts, they turned and walked the same path back to where they had come from. The lights were thankfully left on, making the task of eating much easier. Trip picked up the loaf of bread first, studying it with mistrust in his eyes. The loaf wasnâ€™t really a loaf at all, but a large bun. The crust was hard and difficult to break, but when they did, they could see that the inside was dotted with grains. â€œHere,â€ Trip said, handing Malcolm half. Malcolm accepted it without a word, but, hungry as he was, he didnâ€™t start eating. Instead, he picked up the bottle and unscrewed the cork. Tentatively, he put it up to his nose, smelling the contents. 

â€œIt smells sweet,â€ he said suspiciously. 

â€œItâ€™s green,â€ Trip replied, the suspicion echoed in his voice. A glance around the room, however, showed that the rest of the fortunate few who had received food, had also received the same bread and the same bottle of green liquid. None of them seemed to share Malcolm and Tripâ€™s reservation about it, and were eating and drinking eagerly. With a sigh, Malcolm put the bottle to his lips and took a small sip. 

â€œIt tastes a little like orange juice,â€ he said thoughtfully after swallowing. Trip held his hand out for the bottle, and repeated the procedure with the tentative sip, and the surprised expression when his taste buds reacted to the liquid. 

â€œIt does,â€ he agreed, taking a larger sip. Malcolm took his half of the bread, and dug out a small piece of the grainy inside, deciding to leave the hard crust in favor of being able to fill his belly at a higher speed. Trip followed his example, and it took next to no time to consume the food. 

When they were done, they settled down to inspect their surroundings further. Malcolm identified the man with the cough that he had heard last night as an elderly man with dark skin and a strange pattern circling his bare upper body. The whimpers he had heard came from a young girl. She was silent now, but her face was streaked with tears. She couldnâ€™t be more than twelve-thirteen years old, if the faces of earth children were anything to go by. She was sitting by herself, stealing frightened glances all around her. 

Malcolm quickly came to the conclusion that they shared the room with a very strange group of people. Some of the women had young children with them, clinging on to them for dear life. There were old men with wrinkled faces, and young men with bulging muscles, pretty girls and plain Janes. He could find no rhyme or reason to this odd compilation of individuals. There was even a pack of dogs caged in one corner. 

And then, out of the blue, two familiar faces jumped out of him. Ensign Porter and ensign Beckett were sitting next to the dog cage, looking like the world had fallen apart around them. Which, in a way, it probably had, Malcolm realized. The world that he had woken up to today was entirely different from the one he had fallen asleep in. Nudging Trip, he pointed towards the two men.

â€œOh Jesus,â€ Trip said. To Malcolmâ€™s surprise, there was horror in his voice. 

â€œWhat?â€ he asked, staring bewildered at the commander. 

â€œEnsign Roberts,â€ Trip said grimly. 

â€œWhat?â€ Malcolm repeated, his eyes darting back to the two men. â€œItâ€™s Porter and Beckâ€¦â€ 

And then he saw Roberts. He was sprawled on the floor next to Porter and Beckett, his face black and blue and swollen to the point where it was hard to tell that it was him. 

â€œOh.â€

Malcolm didnâ€™t know what else to say. Nothing could articulate the sudden despair he felt upon realizing that the twisted mass of bruises and swelling belonged to a man who liked to play pranks, and tell jokes. A man he knew. A man he had many times threatened to throw in the brig, but who actually amused him more than he annoyed him. So instead, â€˜ohâ€™ was the only sound that came out. 

He exchanged glances with Trip, and they came to a silent agreement. They got up, keenly aware of all the eyes that honed in on them. No one moved though, and no one stopped them as they made their way over to the three other Enterprise men. 

â€œCommander Tucker!â€ Beckett exclaimed, his eyes big and round at the unexpected apparition. Those two words commanded the attention of Porter, and his eyes echoed the surprise expressed by Beckett. The only one who didnâ€™t react, even the slightest, was Roberts.

â€œIs heâ€¦â€ Trip started, the question more than adequately finished by the silence as he trailed off. 

â€œNo,â€ said Beckett. â€œThough I think he might wish that he was.â€ 

â€œWhat happened?â€ Malcolm asked, staring at the man lying lifeless on the floor. 

â€œIâ€¦â€ Porter started, but trailed off without finding the words. 

â€œThey came out of nowhere,â€ said Beckett, his eyes pleading, as if begging Malcolm to understand that there had been nothing that he could do. â€œWe heard a commotion outside,â€ he continued. â€œAnd then they were just there. He tried to run off into the woods, and one of thoseâ€¦ menâ€¦ followed him. He didnâ€™t get far, and when they caught him, he fought to get away again. They didnâ€™t like that.â€ 

Tripâ€™s hand rose, his fingers gingerly touching the gash on his forehead. Malcolm balled his own hands up into fists. Without a word, he knelt down by Roberts, assessing his injuries and coming to the conclusion that there was nothing more he could do that the other two hadnâ€™t already done for him. Hopefully, it would be enough.


End file.
